Diary Chapter 1

I'm not certain where to start. I suppose the start is the best since at some stage I hope to use the whole experience for my dissertation.

Before I go into everything though, it's probably better if I summarised where we are at physically. I have lacerations of the scalp and my neck is broken. My right arm is broken, and I have marks on my shoulders and legs from the seatbelt. I'm pretty much OK now and getting stronger every day.

Nina, who was conscious for the accident, has a broken right arm, just above the wrist. The ligament in her ankle was torn too. She is being cared for on a daily basis by Mum and Dad. Nina is physically OK, so I hope the same is true for her thoughts.

Sandy is the worse injured of all of us. He has broken his spine in 2 places (like me). He punctured a lung with his rib, his shoulder is broken, and he has the most brain damage. Behind his right eye is both the back of the eye and his brain. He sees two different distances from the eyes, one from his left and one from his right. He also has lacerations of the scalp, one of which looks quite severe.

I think it will take at least one month before they know how best to deal with his eye. At its worst, they will need to open up the skin and kind of screw his scalp back together again. At its best, the swelling will shrink, and his sight will return to normal.

The most difficult thing about his swelling brain is how does one measure damage? Apparently, the more one is conscious of the accident, the less brain damage one has suffered. Nina remembers it well, the car rolling and what we said. She remembers checking out our eyes to ensure that they stayed shut. It seems I had told her that dead people's eyes stayed open. If the eyes stayed open, then this meant we weren't alive. Luckily, our eyes stayed tightly closed. She was bathed in our blood, hanging upside down in the Ute in the middle of the South Australian outback. A motorist from from our front waved her out through the back of the Ute. She climed out using the doona and then they both heard me - I think I was mumbling and/or calling her name. They cut me out of the car, but left Sandy, who was unconscious, hanging there until the ambulance came.

The motorist was from Ballarat in Victoria, and carried his wife and two girls slightly older than Nina (sisters?). The girls cuddled her and the motorist waved down other trucks and vehicles had come to help. I'm not sure how many people there were or what I did during that time. Nina says that the ambulance took around 30 minutes to arrive from Whyalla.

The ambulance officers told her very little, and she was taken to the children's ward where her broken arm was immobilised. It was connected to a hook in the roof all night. At some stage she was advised that Sandy and I would be OK in the long term. She was also told it was OK to ring people in Melbourne. Mum says she just couldn't shut her up. Nina also told Medicos our home addresses, local doctor, allergies and other vital bits and pieces.Thank God she was there, unhurt (relatively) and able to function.

We were sent to Adelaide by the Flying Doctor the next morning and she came too. She got very sick though. Eventually, she was released to Mum's at the Children's Hospital; it must have been on the 29th of December 2004. Unfortunately for her in some ways, she remembers everything. Fortunately for her, there was no brain trauma.

I remember the point up to the accident. I remember turning the wheel left, right, and centre, while pushing the brakes. Nothing made a difference. The car in front got further away. I remember losing the steering of the car and Sandy saying something like "Uh Oh the steering" and me not answering because I was concentrating so hard. Nina says she kind of shut her eyes from here, though she knew when the car had somersaulted 4 times. I couldn't say thing because I had no energy at all besides what I needed for the car. I remember not remembering anything except the steering. I thought I said to Nina after the accident "Well I didn't fall asleep at the wheel!" But apparently, I said it in casualty in Whyalla. I had wondered why I said that, maybe it was in the safe driving booklet I got from Port Agusta. The book was supposed to tell you about safe driving in South Australia, but it didn't tell you the wind could grab your front wheels and that you would be helpless then. Other people know about it, but they don't think enough drivers have been affected by it for signs to be posted!

I then woke at Whyalla hospital, I must've lain in the Emergency Department. And they spoke to me, she said she was the Ambulance Officer that had that had rescued me past Iron Knob. She had a lovely face. I remember consciousness returning in the emergency ward, and the wish that it wouldn't because unconsciousness was so delicious.

I asked the Ambulance Officer about Nina, what were her injuries and would she be okay? She told me about Nina's breaks and said that she had helped the Ambulance Officers with vital information. She told me Nina was okay. She then told me about my own injuries, which I don't really remember- something about broken neck, and I would be okay. She then told me about Sandy's injuries, and that they had let the air escape from his lung until it had collapsed. They then filled his lung again. She can said (I thought) that he was being operated on to restore his sight. She also said he had broken his arm and neck in two places. I asked her again whether he woukd be OK, and she said that he would. Once I knew they were all okay, I fell back asleep or unconscious. Then she woke me to tell we are going to Adelaide in the Flying Doctor plane along with Sandy and Nina. At some stage, she asked me about allergies, we have none.

It must have been then when Nina demanded to see us. I came out to see her in a wheelchair after hearing her voice and demanding to see her. My right side was swollen Apparently I said, I loved her and I was sorry. I also told her I was too too swollen on my right side to hug her, so I hugged her on my left side. She was not allowed to see Sandy. That must've have been when I said the stuff about falling asleep at the wheel. Afterwards we flew to Adelaide at some stage because I remember Sandy being slid on a stretcher next to me in the hospital and being shown him.

The next thing I remember was waiting up in the spinal unit ward at Adelaide public hospital with curtains around me.

And this is basically the summary of our current medical condition, including various levels of consciousness, we have endured. I can smell cigarette smoke around the garden (in Ivanhoe, Melbourne) which absolutely stinks and makes me feel like vomiting. Maybe I'll go in and shave my legs!